


Leverage, Season 2, Episode 10, The Runway Job

by TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer



Category: Leverage
Genre: Analysis, Episode Review, Episode: s02e10 The Runway Job, Meta, Nonfiction, Season/Series 02, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-01
Updated: 2020-06-01
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:42:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24482974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer/pseuds/TheSomewhatRamblingReviewer
Summary: Warning: Contains spoilers for the episode and the rest of the series. Complete.
Kudos: 4





	Leverage, Season 2, Episode 10, The Runway Job

Open to a sweatshop run by an Asian-American couple. A woman passes out.

In the bar, Nate, a legal aide translator, and the woman talk about the fact the latter works in a sweatshop. There’s a moment I really like where Hutton’s acting makes it clear that Nate honestly doesn’t care if the woman is here illegally and that, if she is, he’ll still help, but he does actually need to know whether she is or isn’t in order to make a plan.

It turns out the woman is, but she’s essentially being held captive by the people who got her said legal status.

Nate promises to help, the two women leave, and Tara bounces over.

I had a lot of problems with The Lost Heir Job, but I like Tara, and it’s nice to see Jeri Ryan in such a role. I’ve never thought she was a bad actress, but I’ve never really liked any of the characters I’ve seen her play before Leverage. When it came Voyager, I’ve just never cared much for story arcs about characters rediscovering their roots/humanity. Everything else I’ve seen her in, she’s been an Ice Queen femme fatale, and again, the issue was me not caring for that sort of character rather than any problems with her acting skills.

Nate plans to help the woman get enough money to bring her parents over and be free, and Tara wants to go bigger. He asks why she’s even here, and she says Sophie told her that he always met the clients with Sophie.

He coldly agrees, yes, he always does with _Sophie_.

Next, in headquarters, the poly trio is video-chatting with Sophie about Tara. She assures them she’s still going to be their mother and mother-in-law one day, but right now, she wants them to try to accept Tara as an older sister/aunt figure.

On a more serious note, it’s revealed Eliot still doesn’t trust Sophie, but the point is, he accepts her for the sake of the others. With Nate not liking or trusting Tara, he isn’t sure he and his future spouses should even give her a chance.

The poly trio do agree Tara is hot, although, it’s ambiguous if Parker is actually agreeing or just not fully grasping what the other two mean.

Personally, I view Parker as either heavily demisexual or outright asexual, but based on certain interactions with other female characters, I don’t discount the possibility she might be biromantic.

Eliot then calls Sophie on the fact she’s not okay over the fact Nate let her leave.

Nate and Tara come in, and Parker quietly says, “I just miss you.” Aw.

The call’s ended, and everyone talks. The bad couple of the week made their fortune off of selling knock-off designer items.

Sweatshops are bad, but I hope the show isn’t declaring knock-off designer items are all bad, too.

The wife is a wannabe fashion designer, and the husband handles all their accounts.

So, Team Leverage makes the wife think Tara is a big-shot fashion designer, and then, she and PA Eliot set out to meet her. Eliot is wearing noticeable eyeliner, and Tara laughs at how Hardison teases his future husband over this.

At the meeting, Tara accidentally on purpose drops her design book, and returning it, the wife has starry-eyes. Looking at the wife’s designs, Tara declares they should get together later to talk.

Next, at the fashion show, everyone is working the con. Parker is running around in a headset. Eliot has changed, and now, he’s wearing glasses. Nate is an annoying fashion guy, and Hardison is a fashion editor.

It’s decided the wife has potential, especially since Nate’s new designer has just been arrested due to being caught with a hooker.

Tara, Nate, and Eliot go to the sweatshop. The husband is suspicious, and there’s more great acting by Hutton when Nate looks down at all the slaves, including his client. The wife, however, hands over money when Tara and Nate say they need it to help get the wife into the business.

Outside, Nate and Tara argue about how they both handled things in the office, and I hope he wasn’t her or Eliot’s ride since he just drove off without either of them.

Back in headquarters, apparently, Tara is trusted enough to be left alone there. She talks to Sophie, and though it was established Sophie was in Paris earlier, now, she’s in some desert place. Tara wants to bounce, and Sophie says, no, someone has to keep her future husband alive until their tension-filled dance transitions into a relationship and watch out for her future daughter and sons-in-law.

When Tara calls Nate sexy, however, she’s all, ‘Excuse me?’

The others minus Eliot come in, though, and the call ends.

Nate has gotten a call from the wife about the rest of the money, but it’s all whispery and cuts off.

Eliot is busy flirting with a model when Nate directs him to go back to the sweatshop, and he talks right in front of her, but she doesn’t react. Then, he just rudely walks away.

Even if she doesn’t speak English, she’d still find it weird this guy with no visible headset or phone was suddenly just talking to thin air. And if she does speak English, why in the hell would he be saying this within earshot of her?

I don’t believe Eliot is the type who believes a woman being a model automatically means she has low intelligence, and I’m not sure I believe he’d be so rude in leaving unless it was an emergency, either, but he did.

Nate and Parker plan to go the house, and ordering Tara to stay out of things, he takes her earbud away.

When Nate and Parker get to the house, it explodes. He orders Hardison to try to find out if the BCotW made it out or not, and Parker is good at mathematics.

At the sweatshop, Tara has joined Eliot, and she yells in his ear in order to talk to Nate. Her not understanding the concept of the earbuds, I’m pretty sure this is just an act to get some payback here.

Then, Nate orders them to get out of the sweatshop, and thankfully, it’s empty besides them. Unthankfully, Triad members show up before they can leave.

Eliot starts telling her what to do in order for him to get them out safely, but she decides to take a different tact, and he’s impressed by her action skills.

Meanwhile, Hardison believes the wife is alive but the husband isn’t.

At the sweatshop, Nate orders Parker to stay with the car, and talking to Hardison, it’s discovered the husband is Triad.

And still alive as he comes into the sweatshop with even more men. He also calls his wife a cow.

Wow. For all she’s just as evil as he is, she could still do better. Be an independent single villainess or find a fellow evil man who supports her dreams and doesn’t verbally demean her. It was shown she was the one handling the sweatshop workers, and this is the appreciation she gets from him?

Hardison tries to tell Nate what to say, but no, Nate’s doing things his own way. He offers next year’s designs in lieu of the money the husband wants, and against his objections, Tara volunteers herself as collateral.

After this, Tara’s definitely earned herself Team Leverage status in my eyes. This is brave, and this is her saying, ‘I’m trusting you all,’ when for all she might not have gained their trust yet, they haven’t done anything to earn hers, either.

At headquarters, the others aren’t happy with him for putting Tara in danger for the sake of the con, but they go along with the new plan.

Over at the fashion show, they all minus Hardison run around, and at one point, Parker is posing as a model. She’s more-or-less manhandled in a chair for makeup and stuff, and I feel majorly claustrophobic just watching it. Also, I appreciate her being critical of the clothes being severely impractical in comparison to the type of clothes she wears rather than her being judge-y towards models or people who simply enjoy fashion.

Eliot feels the need to make it clear he’s had plenty of sex with female models.

To be clear, I don’t care how much sex a character does or doesn’t have. What I don’t like is when characters, male or female, parade around the fact they have sex as if it’s some indicator of how great they are. Generally, in this day and age, an adult who wants to have consensual sex with another adult, even if it might take some work due to certain factors, isn’t going to have to scour the earth to find another consenting adult.

Maybe the average person won’t be able to convince a model to have sex with them, but someone being able to convince a model to doesn’t mean they’re somehow superior to other people.

After the chair, Parker is thrust onto a runway, she falls, and tons of photographers crowd her from above.

This episode is not good for people with a certain type of claustrophobia.

Over at the sweatshop, the husband notes, “You must have a lot of trust in your friends. Although, they don't seem worthy of such devotion.”

Well, they didn’t make any wedding vows to her, and so, they’re a few big steps above him, at least.

In response, she tells him all about Nate and the con. She suggests she has a better way than Nate’s offer of fixing the husband’s problems.

Meanwhile, Team Leverage has arrived, and Eliot makes it clear: If things start going wrong, Nate is to call them in ASAP.

Inside, the husband reveals he called the police on Nate.

Because, an international criminal calling the police won’t end badly for the international criminal at all.

The police come, and the husband is arrested due to Leverage trickery. Nate pretends to be Interpol, and wouldn’t it be funny if Sterling hearing about this is what made him decide to become real Interpol?

There’s a scene of the wife working in a different sweatshop as a labourer. I don’t like this for a variety of reasons, but I’m not arguing she isn’t an evil person.

Then, it’s revealed Tara’s double-cross wasn’t. She and Nate agreed on the trickery via code before he left her.

Later, Nate gives the money to the client for her and her parents, and it’s revealed the legal aide is now running the BCotW’s place. As such, it’s no longer a sweatshop, and the workers are being treated much, much better.

Nate gives Tara her cut and her earbud back. She acknowledges Team Leverage is the best, but when he walks away, she adds, “But no one in the world is as good as you think you are.” Heh. And true.

At headquarters, he and Sophie argue, and she hangs up on him.

Fin.


End file.
